Their customer service is HORRENDOUS. I Think it’s also mostly because they outsource to countries were the people, even though they might mean well, have absolutely no idea what customer service means or have a very different concept of it (which is just to apologies without really practically solving the problem or making things right. Their making things right is just being polite and apologizing).
But AirBnB knows this. They make exorbitant amount of money yet offer shi**y service. Why hasn’t another company taken over yet?
Facebook market place, groups. If you start another competitor it will grow again and become a monster like Airbnb is now full of legal bsht and so big that it becomes so expensive to run - fees. Do it organically, directly with the owners via Facebook or local ads.
Airbnb for travellers, in exchange for their high fees, do not offer any protection or support - found out about it on multiple occasions when my host cancelled on me day before my month-stay or Internet, advertised as fast, was non-existent and caused me trouble at work. I may as well just deal with it directly with owner as Airbnb is useless in such cases.
Most of the time, I just book few nights and do business directly with the owner - Airbnb charges me and host, so generally you do it directly for 50-60% of what Airbnb would charge you for the reservation. After few years of travelling I generally have WhatsApp numbers of the hosts in place I generally travel to and book it with them directly.
The only thing Airbnb is good is the reviews of a place, maybe Facebook should add it somewhere, like a new feature or something. Or a little service for advertising apartments with reviews and giving you contact number or something max. Something very lean.
Ah and forgot about booking, in Europe I generally use booking com and filter search by apartments - way more apartments and way cheaper than Airbnb.